Olive Pink Opera to Headline the Desert Song Festival in 2020

The Olive Pink Opera is a heritage opera about the life and work of Olive Muriel Pink (1886-1975), a woman ahead of her time. It will add to the two books, a play, an artistic performance and several art exhibitions that explore and celebrate her extraordinary life and legendary struggles.

Olive Pink was an artist, early native plant gardener, anthropologist, and a strident activist for the rights of Aboriginal people. The Olive Pink Opera, composed by Professor Emerita Anne Boyd AM, will be the signature event of next year’s renowned Desert Song Festival. The libretto, created by the composer, is based on local stories by both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people. The Opera will be performed in the garden Olive Pink founded and now named in her honour, in September 2020.

The Olive Pink Opera is a transformative arts experience bringing together the rich heritages of Aboriginal culture and Opera to create a new version of opera in Australia and the world. This is a showcase of the NT that will be peerless! Nowhere else does such an opportunity exist to bring together the collaboration between the composer Emerita Professor Anne Boyd AM, the Desert Song Festival and Central Australian Aboriginal Women’s Choir and other Aboriginal artisits, to create a truly new vision of telling Australian stories through opera.

There will be three public performances, on the 10th, 11th and 12th September, plus a restricted access preview on the 9th September.

Register your interest in coming to this ground breaking event by providing your email address below and we will let you know as soon as tickets become available.

Welcome to the Olive Pink Botanic Garden

The Garden was founded in 1956 by Miss Olive Muriel Pink as the Australian arid regions flora reserve.

Today we carry on this tradition as an arid zone Botanic Garden specialising in flora from Australia's vast interior.

You can support us by making a donation, becoming a friend or by just sharing in our love of plants.